What I did instead was put on the grid and snap to grid option, arranged my icons and the likes how I wanted them, gave it the "pin" behavior and everything worked out fine. I wish I could show it off but I have tons to do before the game is ready for demonstration.

Well the good news is that might work for me, because I need control. I intend on updating my game later, adding new skills, changing algorithms of current skills, etc. The ability to choose where everything goes is important because of that, and it's the general direction I've been heading.

I guess I'll experiment some more with how I want to do it all.

EDIT:

Forgot all about "pin" option. I was able to pin things to the main 9-patch window and now it's pretty easy getting all the items where I need them to be. As long as things are on screen in the editor it seems to work perfectly fine.

Classic method that seems to work: have the enemy shoot out an invisible "detector" every few seconds so he knows if he can see anything in front of him. If that detector hits anything, it triggers the enemy to run his "shooting" function or group or however you have it set up.

Also check out the distance(x1,y1,x2,y2) thing when determining how far two things are from each other. That can help, too.

Objects involved: 9-patch, Sprite, SpriteFont

What I'm trying to accomplish: 9-patch as the menu holder, able to be moved around (by dragging an on-screen icon around). Sprite has various animation frames, each is a different "skill" icon. SpriteFont will spawn next to the skill icon sprite, and depending on the animation frame (or if I need to specify) what that skill's level currently is.

Description: I want to make menu windows using the 9-patch plugin, so it can be various windows holding various objects that can be moved about on the screen.

My first try is a skills menu, and it either needs various pages or a method to scroll up and down while keeping the contents of the menu on itself. The menu needs to be a list consisting of another object.

MOCKUP:

Yes, and every person I've come across who uses IE is not the target audience for my games. Maybe if I were doing angry birds or the likes, but I'm interested in a more learned audience. I don't make casual games, and IE is for the casual user, which every gamer I know uses the "IE is good for downloading another browser" line when discussing such a topic. If people spend too much time trying to make things compatible with Microsoft platforms, that would make them all look like jerks the past 20 years for not caring about anything _but_ Microsoft platforms. It's easier to make things for every other platform, and if you have the time, THEN you release for Microsoft, or Nintendo, or whoever you have to get all special for. Target the biggest audience first, and IE is not part of that target.

I'm glad you guys are interested in appealing to senses for evident customer bases, but it's important to also know your base. Just because a large group of people still have CD Players, it would be silly to try to sell them MP3's if they're stuck on the CD, won't it? It's just music, so what's the big deal? It's not compatible, and to make it compatible means the customer would have to suffer through making it so, no matter how easy I make it. (You can relate the same situation to how easy it is to play Ultima Online in Windows, but in Linux you need the Linux client which was developed but not kept up with).

It just so happens Microsoft's IE and Windows platforms are only in the game because they have the money to be in the game, not because they have anything to bring to the table. I've seen this before with RIM, and called it ages ago, no one believed me, but where are they now? Just because we can still see Betelgeuse doesn't mean it hasn't gone supernova yet.

To each their own, and I am in this for business, and I can snub my nose at a small section of people. It's a less used browser and I don't see it ever being usable in the future. It's a branch of Mosaic and a bad one. Firefox is the most updated version of that project and most compatible. This isn't so much about preference as it is about stability. Always has been, for me at least. Thanks for the input though. I'll go with what works, and suggest others do the same.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/11127546/platformengine.capx

It's mine, but it should work for any platformer. It's only graphics and animations, one bug I can't remember (it's with jumping, that's a little hint) but all in all it's a nice package. Has backdash, attacking, backflips, sneaking, blocking, the works.

Also, there are TONS of animations NOT being used as well, so enjoy!

I'm about to start designing an inventory system, and I have NEVER done anything like this before. I suggest you read up on tutorials, search the forums for other users who have done it, etc. Also search Google for other code besides C2 that someone has made, and see how they do it, as well. It's as hard as programming anything else (which isn't hard at all) but I do think an inventory system requires a little more planning than most other things.

It's a good practice to use OGG files for sound. Microsoft is the ONLY one who doesn't support OGG as far as I know. It's cute you guys like to have your games working in IE, but I think it's time to put on the big boy pants and realize Internet Explorer is not just the least used browser, but it's also the most incompatible with HTML3...and 4 is a struggle, and I won't even get into 5. I'm sure the reason ACID tests always displayed funky in IE was due to them not knowing what they were doing, and I'm pretty sure if I were a MS employee, when Balmer told me to "get the acid test working" I would never have fixed the actual problems, but instead had just finagled until acid, and ONLY acid, was working.

I know I know, to each his own...but I don't live on Mars because there is no Oxygen. Microsoft, in turn, has asked us all to live on Mars since 3.11 and guess what? No oxygen. It's great for the view, but hardly worth the trip in the end. Don't hang yourselves up on getting your game to work in IE, because I gave up on that when I was learning HTML standards. I don't even put "if IE" tags in my web pages. If you use IE, you don't need to be at my page, that sort of thing. If it works right, bravo, if not, oh well sorry.

I think it's time Microsoft had a taste of their own medicine anyways. For all the systems I can't play my old games on, I won't be remiss for excluding Microsoft from my personal plans.

The product is still being developed on, but basic editing is the main concern because there will be more stable releases in the future. There have been many updates, and using the full version I haven't encountered any of the bugs you have mentioned. I got it way back during the early adopters, and it's worked 100% of the time aside from beta builds. I try to not use beta builds unless it contains features I could benefit from, and as best practice I keep a backup of my files anyways. It's all preference. I should say also, that if you do graphics in a proper way, you can bypass effects for a different effect. HTML5 canvas and WebGL are still being developed on as well, and _hardware still has to catch up!_ To release to as many platforms as possible, you have to make sacrifices of what you think is cool for players, which in turn end up process intensive. This is a competitive field, but making that sacrifice of "cool looking" for speed and finding different display methods during this time can be beneficial on the whole. Know your own limitations, and it's important to know the limitations of your audience.

It's worth the buy if you're witty enough to live in the moment, not just with C2's stage of development, but HTML's as well. Also remember Acid3tests, as browsers aren't 100% themselves. We are in a developing process, and it's not going to be too much longer before everything (hardware wise) is powerful enough to benefit from the new technologies.

What is the effect you are trying to achieve? I don't think I have a clear view, because there is the scroll to behavior which to me sounds the same thing: the camera never leaving the center point.

Could you explain exactly what it is you're trying to accomplish? Like the final goal that is?

Is there anything other than Pyxel Edit that is actually free? I don't mind the $9 but not before I try it, and I don't see a demo link.